Empowering women. (Photo: WfC)

This report tracks the extent to which Zambia is making progress towards achieving the MDGs focuses on Goals 1 to 7 and assesses Zambia’s national development plans, the main tools for achieving economic and human development, particularly the Fifth National Development Plan (FNDP). It also analyses problems in the way the MDGs are formulated, arguing that unless these are taken care of, the human development conditions of countries such as Zambia will remain poor for a long time. Finally, it makes proposals for post 2015 reform.

At the launch of the MDGs in 2000, Zambia’s human development indicators were weak, owing to the steady deterioration of the economic and social conditions since the mid-1970s, when prices of its main produce copper fell on the world market. From the late 1980s and 1990s Zambia implemented the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund inspired Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), under which significant cuts to public expenditure were applied, considerably weakening delivery of social services in the health, education and other sectors. This period is also when the HIV and AIDS pandemic hit Zambia the hardest.

Mohammed Al-Maskati. (Photo: BCHR)

The Gulf Center for Human Rights (GCHR) and Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR) express their serious concern over ongoing campaign of judicial harassments against human rights defenders in Bahrain, that includes the very recent trial of defender Mohamed Al-Maskati on freedom of assembly related charges.

Family in Blazevo, Novi Pazar, Serbia. (Photo: UNDP)

Serbia’s lack of any long-term vision or commitment as well as any comprehensive development strategies, make it difficult to counter the negative impact of the global economic crisis and establish a solid basis for economic growth, including increased jobs and livelihoods. In this context, with weak democratic institutions and lacking the rule of law, that the MDGs are unlikely to be achieved by 2015. There is thus a strong need to change the current neoliberal economic development paradigm to one that will focus on achieving human development for all.

The latest phase of the Serbian transition to a market economy, started in 2001, was not modelled with a clear vision of achieving economic prosperity and improved livelihoods for all, but focused on the livelihoods of those with economic and political power. Due to the high level of corruption, the lack of effective economic and social policy, and the absence of long-term vision and multisectoral strategies, Serbia cannot counter the consequences of the economic crisis and establish a solid basis for economic growth, one that can increase employment, salaries, livelihoods and quality of life.

Women fetching water. (Photo: African Agenda)

The July 2012 election of Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma to the position of Chair of the African Union represented not only a milestone in the continental body's history, but it also an affirmation that African women occupying leadership positions had come a long way since the Organization of African Unity was established 50 years ago.

At the time of independence, despite being part and parcel of the different liberation struggles and being members of parliament, in a number of countries, and holding ministerial positions in countries like Ghana and Guinea, there was no similar effort to ensure women's voices were heard at continental level with the establishment of the OAU. And whereas voices such as Dr. Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana were posing questions such as “What part can the women of Africa and the women of African descent play in the struggle for African emancipation?”, the Charter of the OAU had no reference to women or the roles they could play, or how the institution could support their advancement or address focus on gender as well as actively ensuring issues of gender equality.

Whether in the realm of environmental oversight, subsidies and tax abatements, consumer labeling and protection, or financial regulation, the human rights impacts of corporate lobbying are extensive.  In the United States, much has been made of the impact of campaign financing on elections following the Citizens United ruling by the US Supreme Court in 2010.  The ruling ostensibly paved the way for vastly increased financial contributions to political action committees, commonly known as ‘Super-PACs’.  But while Citizens Unitedsensitized the public once again to the role of money in elections, this issue has been around for a long time and plays a very big role in the realization of human rights.